


Red Lights, Green Lights

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Episode Tag, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-15
Updated: 2010-02-15
Packaged: 2017-10-07 06:54:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hotch drives Reid to see Mr.Corbett and Reid tries to give him advice on his love life. Hotch is having none of that. Post 3x19. Written in August 2009.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Red Lights, Green Lights

`_There can be no transforming of darkness into light and of apathy into movement without emotion._´  
Carl Jung.

  


Reid waits to see if Hotch puts his seat belt on. It's an odd habit – no, not habit – but sometimes – and it's only sometimes, it's not like Reid can develop a pattern out of it – Hotch lingers, he takes until the car is well on the road to put it on. Most car deaths, when not related to alcohol or drug abuse or speeding, are due to distractions. Maneuvering to get the belt on while driving constitutes a distraction and at some unconscious level, even if he knows nothing is going to happen, Reid is somehow worried. Not wearing a seat belt is secondary offense in this state. Hotch is very meticulous about _everything else_, does he feel an exhilarating lose of control, a defiance, maybe some sort of natural leaning towards abstract danger in that gesture, that delaying of the responsible, safe choice. _Don't do that_. Reid kicks himself mentally because he tries very hard not to do casual profiling on his team – but finally the social-able protection is only skin deep and he finds himself, often, wondering these things.

Like now.

`Close the door, please?´ Hotch says in a polite voice and Reid realizes he is staring ahead to the road but his hand is still resting on the handle to the door of the car, and that door still half open as if Reid hadn't yet decided if he wants to get in or not.

`Sorry.´

He closes the door. Hotch starts the engine.

Reid's head is somewhere else.

He is thinking, still thinking about Cece and the glances she has been casting Hotch's way and how Hotch surely – _surely_ – can't have missed them and maybe saying that they had to leave is his way of gently turning her down. But then again maybe not.

Reid knows better than to try to talk about these things with him. But there's something about the way Hotch has been looking these past months, something that Reid can't put his finger on, he seems at turns anxious and hopeless and faltering, and none of that has to do with the job. And maybe Reid just doesn't know better.

`You could have stayed,´ he offers in a small voice. `You know? For that drink with Cece. You don't have to-´

Hotch makes a low, humorous noise without turning his glance to him.

`That woman didn't want to have a drink, Reid,´ Hotch seems to be enjoying the sight of that, the seemingly naivety of Reid as realization dawns on him, written on his face.

In the brief silence that follows Hotch puts the seat belt on and Reid files the information away, for later, as an afterthought. (Stats, as always, seem to offer a familiar comfort when he is nervous, when the reading of the social signs is particularly difficult and instead of what that blond lawyer might have had in mind for Hotch and embarrassment at discussing a partner's private life what Reid is thinking is how safe belt regulation became effective in December 1, 1984 starting with the state of New York)

`Oh,´ he says. `Then maybe you _really_ should have stayed.´

`No. I'm not-´ Hotch trails off, as if not really knowing what he is not. Reid wonders. What is he not? Interested? Cece was quite attractive, Reid has a hard time believing that's it. Ready? Now that's another matter.

He clears his throat.

`You realize that the sooner you start getting sexually involved with other women the sooner you can progress into meaningful, stable relationships and not just rites of passage, rebound relationships as it were. Statistically for men you age it takes at least year and half after the divorce to start having long-term, satisfying romantic involvements, and if you keep putting it off-´

`Men my age?´ Hotch picks on the safest, most obvious piece of Reid's proposition to make a complain. His expression remains neutral but something in his voice – not warmth but some kind of familiarity – tells Reid that he is not trying pick a fight with him. Reid finds it almost banter-ish, that tone, comforting, and at the same time he knows Hotch is just diverting attention.

`You think you are not ready? How long have you been separated? Don't you think-?´

`I think it's not a conversation I want to have now. With you.´

Body language tells Reid that Hotch immediately regrets that last addendum but nonetheless it makes Reid instinctively look down at his own hands.

`I'm sorry. I didn't-´ he says.

`Don't worry. It's okay.´

Reid looks out, but the night is dark and closed through the windowpane and he finds nothing to fix his eyes on. It's like that with Hotch, more often than not, the never-finished sentences, the lines cut short in the middle, the over-understandings more than the misunderstandings, the layer of verbal lime that lies underneath all everyday conversations but that with him and Hotch sometimes was all that there is, raw and exposed, the very bones.

Reid lets out a long breath.

`What?´

`No, nothing,´ he stiffens in his seat. `I was wondering, could be pass by Mr.Cobertt's house? It will only take a minute.´

Hotch is already steering the wheel and checking the mirrors before he actually answers, which Reid finds encouraging, and a bit annoying.

`Why? Is something about the case-?´

`No, no. I just thought-´ It sounds silly in Reid's head now, he is being soft, he is getting involved emotionally, which is a big no-no. `I thought I should be the one who told Mr.Corbett about Matloff. That I should give him his daughter's watch instead of processing it as evidence.´

`Of course,´ Hotch replies quickly, speeding when the traffic light goes green.  


*  


Reid takes comfort in knowing that he is an excellent profiler and so the look of relief in Mr.Corbett's face (the sense of _closure_ around him) must be genuine, for him to buy it. It's such a small thing, and in the grand scheme of equal small importance, it's not what Reid is being paid for, but it makes him feel good. Better.

He returns to the car walking a bit lighter. As if the weight had been lifted from him as well. He is almost leaping by the time he gets to the door.

Hotch studies him as Reid puts his seat belt on and find a comfortable position in the car, after a bit of shuffling.

`You are a good man, Reid,´ he says, matter-of-factly, as if it just occurred to him.

It's not quite the non-sequitur but it surprises Reid nonetheless. He lets out a low chuckle.

`What?´ Hotch asks.

`Nothing. It's just that, due to my age and appearance, I've gotten used to being called _boy_ or _kid_ at the office. Nobody ever calls me _man_. Unless in an annoying, slightly ridiculing way, of course. It sounds absurd. Doesn't it?´

A small, almost unnoticeable smile darts over Hotch's lips. Reid notices, though.

`I thought you'd be angry,´ Reid says.

`Why?´

`Coming here is sign of an emotional involvement with the case beyond what's advisable in these cases. He carried a gun to court and I let it go unreported.´

`And that bit wasn't a smartest move. But you know that,´ Hotch frowns. The car stops at the red lights. `But the other thing, Reid... Don't let anyone, certainly don't let me, make you think that caring is something you should be ashamed of. Caring is what makes you a good _man_.´

Reid nods softly, unable to find a better reply than silence – heavy, grateful silence. He looks at the traffic light. He knows these are particularly slow ones. The traffic lights in this avenue are 2.8 seconds slower to change than the average Virginia traffic lights. 2.8 seconds might seem like a ridiculous meaningless amount of time but right now Reid thinks it's daunting, an all-encompassing eternity. And maybe, with Hotch, enough.

`You know, Hotch. You might think you are not ready to commit to new sexual relationships yet, after Haley,´ Reid almost _feels_ rather than sees the muscles in Hotch's body tense at the name. Reid goes on: `But believe me, you are doing more than adequately with other kinds of relationships.´

He smiles, as if that were the punchline.

`You are doing fine,´ he repeats, baring down the language.

Hotch shakes his head, but he is sort-of-smirking, a "_oh shut up_" expression on his face.

But the lights change to green again and that distracts Hotch; Reid is grateful for it, he was expecting some sort of retribution for his boldness. He watches Hotch drive on in silence, but there's the ghost of that smile.

Reid feels oddly smug.

Like he, too, is doing just fine at this.


End file.
